Even more disgusting if someone trusted to be on a ground jury is laughing off a whip welt and saying “I would have beat him too”.
This isn’t a horse that was acting aggressively toward someone. This was a horse that wasn’t performing an OPTIONAL competition test to the standards of his rider and was BEATEN for it.
If these types of statements and brushing off of whip welts are the standard to which we are holding TDs and GJs… yikes.
Quoting again. Because it needs to be said.
Exactly.
This really pisses me off actually.
For the past two years we have had social licensing SHOVED down our throats and how us as riders and owners have to do our best, be our best, be nice online etc etc, which I mean I didn’t mind because I already practice good horsemanship so I’m not worried.
However, when the big wigs, the associations AND the officials are turning a blind eye, making jokes about abuse and even coaching some of these idiot horse abusers I really have question why the hell we should care about their social licensing problems.
I do not know this person - but maybe it is a case that a person should not be judged on one bad comment at a time of stress when everything else they have done has shown a different kind of person than that comment represents.
Again, I do not know them, I am not defending that comment.
I am shocked that someone can hit hard enough to make welts during a test.
There’s a trainer I know of not too far from me that refers to that as “whip rash”. Claims it’s a sign of a horse truly earning their place in the dressage world.
Good thing she retired from coaching…she also is a cother and has a great reputation in the dressage world. I’m so over these people.
I hear what you’re saying, but when you’re in a position of TD or GJ, it is not the time or the place to be making light of a welt (if there ever is time or a place).
… wth
As far as Sue, I’m not saying let’s hang her out to dry or go on a public crucification rant. It’s an older story and while I trust it happened, there’s always an element of context. I’m just saying that NO ONE should be making that type of comment in any way, but especially not an official. And just because someone is “well respected” or “a good horseman” (are they???) doesn’t mean they get a free pass to laugh about abuse.
I didn’t get the memo that joking about abuse is ok.
Its not.
I think is the crux of the concern.
I am now wondering if we riders can help overcome the abusiveness of these big name riders.
When I started reading the COTH Forums many years ago I was struck by the pretty frequent answers of (roughly quoted “Your horse needs a Come To Jesus” session, particularly if the horse does not give generous prompt reactions to the rider’s driving legs.
In my over 50 years of riding, both my own horses and on the lesson horses, I have come to the conclusion that those CTJ are abusive, done to relieve the rider’s frustrations. The horses do not like them at all, the horses get antsy because they truly do not understand WHY they are being slashed with the whip or gauged by the spurs, the horses end up resenting being ridden, and it puts training, true training that turns the horse into a pleasant riding animal with impulse, way back.
Of course being so darn handicapped right now if I tried to do a CTJ moment on the lesson horses I ride the horses would decide that it just does not pay to make the effort to try and obey me, and my riding teacher would yank me off the horse if the horse did not throw me off first. She truly values her lesson horses and except in truly exceptional circumstances would not allow this.
If lots of people use CTJ moments when they get frustrated it ends up being the “normal” way to train the horse. Spectators and people learning to ride become used to it and believe the rationalizations when the upper level riders visibly abuse the horse. After all if a large number of riders and trainers use these CTJ moments it MUST BE THE RIGHT WAY TO TRAIN A HORSE, especially if the rider wants to win a ribbon.
The poor horses.
This post was flagged by the community and is temporarily hidden.
Matt Brown shared a lengthy post via Facebook and I am curious as to how others may interpret it, or what they take away from it. It has been shared directly nearly 200 times, including by ULRs.
Matt Cecily Brown
Tuesday, September 10th, 2024 at 8:13 PM
Sorry this is lengthy, but I think we’ve well established ourselves as long winded…
In our notes, labeled as: To post, or not to post???
Oh you guys…. This should be a moment where I say, yes, finally, people are waking up and seeing the way we used to do things is not ok anymore.
But… I don’t know if it’s just that people haven’t been paying attention, are willfully ignorant, or are only willing to jump on a bandwagon once it’s reliably and unquestionably barreling down the hill… but - wake up!!
Horse abuse comes in many shapes and sizes, it is a very non-discriminatory and hungry beast.
It looks like chemical and manual hypersenstisation before show jumping. Punching your horse in the face in dressage warm up at an FEI while the stewards turn a blind eye. IV injecting your horse with magnesium in your trailer before FEI dressage. Purposefully flipping an overly bold horse over an XC fence to teach it a lesson. Withholding water from it before dressage. Shooting at it with an air soft gun to get it in front of the leg. Simple rolkur starts to sound like child’s play. Show jumping practice with carpet tacks or fishing line dangling across the standards. Descending oxers and a sedative cocktail on board for show jumping prep schools (what’s in that backpack? Who’s covering up the positive drug tests?). Running a horse that you know is injured and compromised, keeping it on ice from the moment it arrives at the venue and then having it ambulanced off mid way through the course. Continuously presenting lame horses to the ground jury for FEI jogs. Sending them to the vet hospital for a nerving procedure under a different name. Drugging a horse for sale with a quickly metabolized sedative so that it behaves when people come to ride it but drug tests clean during the vetting a few days later. These are all things I’ve personally witnessed over the last few years at the upper levels of the sport.
Honestly, abuse is around almost every corner of every farm and horseshow if you have your eyes open and are paying attention, and most, if not all of our idols practice or have practiced some form of it.
I’m incredibly ashamed but feel it’s incumbent upon me, and only honest to admit, that my job coming up as a rider was to be “the enforcer”. I’ve whacked a horse in the face, kicked a horse in the gut, overdone the whip during trailer loading and cross country schooling. I’ve jerked them in the mouths and made bad decisions that have poorly affected their health and soundness. I’ve lost my temper and done some really bad, uneducated and rough riding.
But since then, I’ve learned and grown, I’ve become more educated about how horses think and learn. I’ve evolved in my understanding of horses, horse care, and horse training. I look back at my former self and I can say that I had moments that today I am utterly and completely ashamed of.
But I’ve learned from all of those moments and I truly believe that the knowledge and experience I’ve gained from my desire to learn how to be better for the horses has made it so that now I can do real good in the lives of my horses and students.
I know first-hand what it’s like to run out of patience and tools. And now I know, through my own experiences, how to overcome those shortcomings and try to be a good and kind horseman to my horses. I was not born perfect and patient and with all of the knowledge I would need to face all of the challenges that life and horses present to us. I’ve had to come by those lessons through trial and error. I’d take back all of my mistakes if I could. And still, to this day, I have to remind myself to pause, take a moment and reset, because I now know what the moment just before I lose my patience feels like.
I don’t think I’d be remiss in reminding everyone that most of us were taught as we were coming up that horses “need discipline”. It’s literally still legal and accepted to whip horses in competition (but only two times in succession now and not three).
In 2017 I was the highest placed US rider at the Kentucky five star after XC, an accomplishment I’m still very proud of. But, I cringe whenever I watch that video back because of how desperate I was to get my genuine, but ditchy and “water-y” horse around the wet and slippery XC. I used my whip way too much - yet always within the legal competition parameters. Back then I thought that I was helping to give him confidence. Now I know it was only giving me confidence, and that he jumped brilliantly and honestly around that course despite my “encouragements”, not because of them. Even then I felt embarrassed watching the video back and wished I had used my whip less. But around the barns at the end of the day I got pats on the back and told by person after person that it was “good, old fashioned cross country riding”. Now I know better, and I want to keep learning how to be better for my horses.
I admit all of this about myself not to try to explain away the current conversation, but to be honest about what I think the journey towards more enlightened and ethical horsemanship looks like for many of us who are over the age of ten.
Furthermore, I would add that when reading back this stream of consciousness that is this essay, the thing I worried the most about making public was not my own transgressions, but whether or not naming the transgressions I’ve witnessed or have been privy to are sparse enough on details as to not blatantly identify the perpetrators, as I myself, while disgusted by these actions, am not ready to be the whistleblower. And for that fact I also feel shame.
So I would like to offer that this line between training and abuse has not always been a crystal clear unmistakably illuminated line.
Horse training used to be brutal, and that was accepted. Horse training is often still brutal, and thankfully, hopefully, little by little, that brutality is more easily recognized and less readily accepted. And I hope that in 50 years the line between training and brutality will be so blatantly clear that we won’t have to have these conversations and arguments anymore. But we are not there yet. We are in a growth period and a very grey area still. What is one man’s training is another man’s abuse. Which doesn’t excuse the abuse, but it does mean that those of us who seek to build a better sport and better horseman must focus on education and not condemnation.
So, in this moment, if we are going to condemn one, we should likely condemn all, because picking and choosing who we string up surely won’t effectively move the sport forward. I don’t think there’s a single one of us who can say we’ve walked a perfect path on our journey with horses - if you can you’re either lying or have been in horses for two days or less. We ALL must get better at training and caring for our horses. The USEF must get better at holding people accountable, even the idols of our sport, for not only equine abuse, but also human abuse, rather than constantly ignoring things or sweeping things under the rug.
And the collective we must get better at holding people accountable, big name or no name, while also allowing for some grace and empathy. Not excusing transgressions, but identifying them while also being mindful that behind those mistakes are human beings.
My best friend was killed by a careless, thoughtless, selfish drunk driver. Her life cut short, her brilliant spark snuffed, her wonderfullness and promise ripped away from those of us who loved her, in an instant.
The driver went to jail for many years, as he should have. But I have forgiven him, as has her family, for what he caused in what was the lowest moment of his (and our) life. Why? Because no one deserves to live out their lives being defined by their worst moment(s). If they are a piece of shit they will continue to make horrible, selfish decisions and lay waste to every gesture of grace sent their way. They don’t need me to hate them and crucify them to continue being the worst.
But, if they have any chance at redemption or rehabilitation, then they need my love, forgiveness and empathy in order to move past their worst and find something better.
So I would say, hate, name, and disavow the action - but don’t hate the human. Condemn the action, but not the human.
Forgiveness does not mean a free pass to continue being horrible, but it means that we can still treat those who have done despicable things with grace and without righteous cruelty, even while we hold them accountable for their cruel actions.
- Matt and Cecily
Many people grew up immersed in an equestrian culture where cruelty was widely practiced and accepted. I doubt most folks would dispute that. But in the last several years in particular, the topic of abuse has become unavoidable. And so too, IMO, has the question anyone involved with horses should be asking themselves: can I do better?
When people responsible for the training, health and wellbeing of horses do not ask themselves this question, when they do not seek to improve (or worse, subject anyone around them who questions their methods to verbal and emotional abuse), when they remain committed to their cruelty, I think there is great risk in suggesting “picking and choosing who we string up surely won’t effectively move the sport forward” and I disagree.
In this case, we are talking about an adult, a professional, punching horses in the head - and that is only a single transgression - caught on video multiple times.
Why are we talking about grace and forgiveness and empathy before any consequences from governing bodies have been doled out? Why are we shielding abusers and not horses?
Lastly, can we give the emotionally charged language a rest? “Stringing up”, “blackmail”, just I got “witch hunt” and “hijacking” (on today, of all days).
I was honestly disappointed by this. I figured ULRs would not support going after this person the way they should. I agree he is human. But he needs repercussions. Not a free pass.
Regarding social license to operate, the “normal” way to train a horse, etc.
John Q. Public is outraged to learn that sport horse riders whip their horses. Yet the same John Q. Public watches the Triple Crown races every year, so apparently is okay with jockeys whipping their horses.
Why the dichotomy?
Thank you Maria for this post.
I hope people who can do put in a complaint about the vet.
Whether she is a battered spouse, or not, the complaint system should assist with getting mental heath assistance. At least that is how it works in Ontario, Canada.
To me this feels like everyones free pass of “I’ve done terrible things in the past, and now I know people are watching and will not do them anymore”
It doesn’t seem like AM “ran out of tools”, this was the first tool he went to, systematically over many years, with multiple horses.
It reminds me of the saying that your character is defined by what you do when no one is watching. It seems now that people just want to feel absolved of prior past behaviors, while being put on notice that people are watching.
A vulnerable and heartfelt post.
CDJ came forward nearly immediately and we have yet to hear from AM. No statement from AM disgusts me. And if he thinks that his business wont come crashing down by saying nothing, I suspect he will be proven wrong. And the sponsors who stay with him will be branded by that.
Could not agree more. Really disappointed in the ULRs. However I’ve witnessed my share of seeing abuse from ULRs so … Not surprised
also, I think a huge glaring issue is that this is not an issue isolated to upper level riders. My mare was ruined by a local trainer, who beat my horse repeatedly, we have been gone 5 years and are still struggling with her explosive behavior.
I work in another industry that has been heavily reported by the NYT (and other major news outlets) in the last 2-3 years. I can assure you the stories they publish in regards to that industry are no more balanced or accurate than their sensational animal abuse stories. That is the danger of people blindly believing everything they read in the news though isn’t it- people rely on journalists who are not experts in any given industry to give them facts, and all too frequently those “facts” are misrepresented or inaccurate.
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